Description

Just a generation after the events depicted in the first Icewind Dale, a new threat has appeared in the Northern region of Forgotten Realms. Something - or somebody - is trying to cut off the Ten Towns area from the rest of the world. Hordes of monsters invade peaceful towns and kill their citizens. A party of adventurers happens to be in the region, and upon their arrival they are requested to help to defend the town of Targos against monster invasion. But once they have accepted the quest, the adventurers realize it will only be the beginning of a long and perilous journey...

Icewind Dale II is a role-playing game that uses the Infinity Engine, first introduced in Baldur's Gate. Like its predecessor, it is more combat-oriented than Baldur's Gate games. The combat flows in real time, but the player is able to pause at any time to give orders to the controlled characters. In the beginning of the game, the player creates the entire party, up to six characters. The game uses the third edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules. There are new character classes (such as monk or sorcerer), new races (e.g. drow) and many new spells. The game features isometric pre-rendered backgrounds, like its predecessors.

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Trivia

Development

According to lead designer Josh Sawyer, the game had a troubled development. It was started after Torn was cancelled and a few people had to be let go as a result. Originally the plan was to develop it in only four months and Sawyer had only two days to write the story and determine the general areas. In the end, development took ten months which is still remarkable because they ported the engine to the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. They had to leave out some of the more extensive re-designs of that edition, but in hindsight the team was pleased with what they managed to accomplish. The only thing they regretted is that they had no time to polish the game which led to some unbalanced fights.

Main menu

The main menu, which shows a view of the Targos docks, cycles between a day and night version depending on the system time.

Music

The composer of the original Icewind Dale and Heart of Winter soundtracks, Jeremy Soule, is completely uncredited on Icewind Dale II, although several of the pieces of music credited to Inon Zur are actually re-orchestrated versions of Soule's music, including the main theme and the Kuldahar theme. The end credits music is not even re-orchestrated. The collector's edition soundtrack CD also includes all of Soule's Heart of Winter music, though again, Soule is completely uncredited.

Title

Black Isle Studios used to code-name its projects after U.S. presidents and vice-presidents, an idea by Josh Sawyer. The code-name for this game is Project Monroe.